Abstract
This research analyzes the role of accountng in the slave system of Brazil in the 19th century, looking at the records and inventories of the slave trade and the accountng of the slave buyers. The study had a qualitatve approach using historiographical research. In terms of media, it was bibliographic and documentary with an exploratory objectve. Part of the documentary research was carried out in the online database Slave Voyages and in person at the Historical and Geographical Insttute of Pernambuco (IAHGP). Based on the analysis of the documental sources, from the slave trade to the purchase of the slaves by plantaton owners, the slaves were registered in the accounts as merchandise/ property to generate wealth. Accountng is considered to have reproduced in its records and fnancial statements the naturalizaton of power relatons established by the colonial system. This study contributed to the refecton on the role of accountng professionals who, from a more critcal perspectve, could have understood the process of objectfcaton to which the enslaved were subjected. It also indicates that they cooperated in the abolitonist movement.
Keywords: Accountng. Slavery. Eighteenth-Century Brazil.
Resumo
A presente pesquisa tem por propósito analisar o papel da contabilidade no sistema escravagista do Brasil oitocentsta, investgando os registros e inventários do tráfco negreiro e também da contabilização dos compradores de escravizados. O estudo teve abordagem qualitatva ao utlizar a pesquisa historiográfca, quantos aos meios, foi bibliográfca e documental com objetvo exploratório. Parte da pesquisa documental foi realizada no banco de dados on-line Slave Voyages e presencialmente no Insttuto Histórico e Geográfco de Pernambuco (IAHGP). Com base na análise das fontes documentais do ciclo da escravidão desde o tráfco negreiro até a compra dos escravizados pelos senhores das fazendas, os escravizados eram registrados contabilmente como uma mercadoria e/ou propriedade para gerar riquezas. Considera-se que a contabilidade reproduziu nos seus registros e demonstrações contábeis a naturalização das relações de poder insttuídas pelo sistema colonial. Este estudo contribuiu para refexão acerca da função dos profssionais da contabilidade que, de uma perspectva mais crítca, poderiam ter compreendido o processo de objetfcação ao qual foram submetdos os escravizados, mas também aponta que cooperaram no movimento abolicionista.
Palavras-chave: Contabilidade. Escravidão. Brasil Oitocentsta.
Resumen
El objetvo de esta investgación es analizar el papel de la contabilidad en el sistema esclavista del Brasil del siglo XIX, indagando los registros e inventarios de la trata de esclavos y también la contabilidad de los compradores de esclavizados. El estudio tuvo un enfoque cualitatvo utlizando la investgación historiográfca, en cuanto a los medios fue bibliográfco y documental con un objetvo exploratorio. Parte de la investgación documental se realizó en el banco de datos en línea Slave Voyages y presencialmente en el Insttuto Histórico y Geográfco de Pernambuco (IAHGP). Con base en el análisis de fuentes documentales, desde la trata de esclavos hasta su compra como esclavizados por parte de los señores de las haciendas, los esclavizados eran registrados en la contabilidad como una mercancía o propiedad para generar riqueza. Se considera que la contabilidad ha reproducido en sus registros y estados fnancieros la naturalización de las relaciones de poder establecidas por el sistema colonial. Este estudio contribuyó a la refexión sobre el rol de los profesionales de la contabilidad que, desde una perspectva más crítca, podrían haber entendido el proceso de objetfcación al que fueron sometdos los esclavizados, pero también señala que cooperaron en el movimiento abolicionista.
Palabras clave: Contabilidad. Esclavitud. Brasil del siglo XIX.
INTRODUCTION
The slave society in Brazil is the result of the implantaton of colonialism, the power relatons that organized society in a racial segregaton, the form of work organizaton and the producton relatons guided by Eurocentrism (Quijano, 2000).
Slavery, one of the greatest humanitarian tragedies, deeply marked Brazilian society and served the interests of the natonal and internatonal economy. Initally, it is important to defne terms. Agostnho Malheiros, in his artcle on slavery in Brazil, defnes it as politcal exclusion - it is not about partsan exclusion, but about relatonship, social partcipaton and public ofce - of enslaved human beings (Malheiros, 1866).
The commercializaton of Africans made by Europeans during modern slavery was called the slave trade (Gomes, 2019), consttutng a process of commodifcaton and objectfcaton of human beings, of withdrawing some from partcipaton in free society. By defniton, the slave was a self-moving asset, one that walks or moves by itself - a form of asset also related to animals (A. R. Silva & Rodrigues, 2013).
For more than three hundred long years, Africans were forcibly removed from their contnent and taken to an unknown territory in order to be used in compulsory work, which characterized, in a sociological sense, withdrawal from the exercise of the individual's humanity and identty.
Partcularly in Brazilian society, slavery lasted longer compared to all other slave colonies in modern times (Brum, 1998). The impacts of this time, therefore, are of paramount importance for understanding the current social and economic inequalites of the contemporary Brazilian scenario.
As historian and journalist Laurentno Gomes said in an interview with the newspaper El País, it is impossible to fully understand Brazilian society without studying and understanding the period of slavery in Brazil (Gomes, 2019). This also applies to world history, as the United Natons has designated August 23 as the Internatonal Day in Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Aboliton. The purpose of this date is to remember the period of slavery so that past mistakes are deconstructed and do not happen again.
The head of UNESCO stated that slavery stll exists in our society, in the form of labor analogous to slavery, and mainly afects women and children. Therefore, the lucid observaton of historical facts is essental to detect and combat analogous forms to current slavery (ONU News, 2020). Visitng the past is important to understanding the present. It is also important to understand how the racist ideology - Black people as inferior and useful only for forced labor - was built and sustained during slavery, remaining in the current periods of Brazilian society, since Black people contnue to be discriminated against and sufer racial prejudice as a result of the constructon of racist ideology of past centuries (Monteiro, 2021).
Thus, the accountng of the riches of slavery was important for the Brazilian territory. These records demonstrated the patrimony, the richness of the Portuguese crown. In the context of Brazilian society, the arrival of the Portuguese boosted the development of accountng, emphasizing that the need to control property already existed from the earliest times in the history of human society (Bugarim, Pinho, Rodrigues, & D. Q. Machado, 2013). The process of origin and evoluton of accountng science, therefore, took place according to the needs of commercial records of society (Medeiros, Hartmann, Druzian, & Dalongaro, 2016; Santos, Smith, & N. P. Machado, 2005).
Accounting was important for the commercial relationship during the period of slavery because it was used as a way of controlling the property of slave owners and investors in the slave trade. This fueled the ambitions and economic-financial aspirations of its investors, being governments and/or businessmen. Ethical and moral questions, therefore, regarding the activity of commodifying people were not the subject of reflection during the period of slavery, since profitability was the ultimate aim of the activity. These reflections on the suppression of human value have been carried out only in current times.
The slave was seen as an inventoried asset, a property. The objectfcaton of people and the deducton of the present times from the treatiment of the slave as a commodity are perceived not only in the commercial relatonship of the slave trade, but in the accountng of slaves, just as other merchandise purchased on the other side of the Atlantc was accounted for (A. R. Silva, 2014).
With the help of the discipline of critcal accountng, subject of qualitatve analysis of the applicaton of accountng in society, which proposes to observe the dark side of accountng history, it analyzes how accountng served as a support to autocratc and/or dictatorial regimes, regimes harmful to social well-being, morality and ethics (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004). In this way, with the use of history and sociology, accountng use is investgated during dark periods of human history.
This study is consttuted of the period of Brazilian slavery (1535-1888) and has as its core the 19th century and the applicaton and use of accountng in this context, by the lords of the farms, to account the enslaved. The interest of the research is focused on a historical-sociological analysis of the economic aspect of the period of slavery and how the conjuncture and legacy of the era of slavery stll impact the current situaton of Brazilian society.
With these historical and sociological events in mind, the following queston arises: What was the role of accountng in the slave system in nineteenth-century Brazil? The research has, as a general objectve, to analyze the role of accountng in the slave system in nineteenth-century Brazil.
The historiographic method, in this research, aims to observe the relatonships of the past to understand the present. In historiographic research, there is a permanent relaton between the past and the present (Pierant, 2008). One can, for example, observe how the relatons of slavery infuenced the racist ideology, since the understanding was that a black person had been made for servitude and was devoid of intelligence. Specifc research on accountng during the period of slavery has been litle explored (A. R. Silva, 2014). That said, this research has a contributory character of proposing the debate for the understanding of this theme. This artcle is divided into literature review, methodological procedures, results and discussion and fnal consideratons.
LITERATURE REVIEW: COMMERCIALIZATION AND ACCOUNTING IN SLAVE TRADE
Accountng is a science whose purpose is to record the wealth of its users and, more broadly, its assets in a technical and programmed way. It is an applied social science, as it metamorphoses to offer information that fits and is intelligible and functonal to the economic, fnancial and cultural changes that have occurred in society (Hendriksen & Van Breda, 2018; Iudícibus, 2021).
Accountng history is progressive, as accountng develops according to the progress and evoluton of human civilizaton, its beginnings date back to antquity. Archaeological fnds from accountng history date the emergence of accountng to approximately 4000 BC. In the frst societes, primitve man had the need to account for his herds, for that he used cave techniques to demarcate his property. Throughout the economic development of societes, both the profession and accountng science have been improving and shaping themselves to offer useful informaton to its users (Coliath, 2014; Medeiros et al., 2016).
Accountng has also improved to serve the needs of business innovatons. Social demands became more complex, demanding more informaton and details and, therefore, greater accountng efciency so that the informaton was fully useful to its users (Iudícibus, 2021; Martns, 2001; A. R. Silva, 2014).
Since accountng is a science that adapts to the reality and needs of society, in the period of humanity in which slavery was the economic source of wealth for natons, enslaved people were considered merchandise by their masters. Accountng science was used with a specifc role of accountng for these assets (accountng asset).
This accountng became possible with the colonialism established in Latn America and the impositon of one of its bases, ethnic classifcaton as a Eurocentric power standard, the concept of coloniality of power (Quijano, 2000). It is observed that the Spaniards and Portuguese, the later in Brazil, were conceived as a dominant race and, therefore, had access to work and remuneraton, although hierarchically superior actvites were reserved for the nobility.
Individuals brought from the African contnent, called blacks, were relegated to slavery. Thus, for Quijano, the coloniality of power is the inaugural milestone of the differentaton and hierarchizaton of races as an oppressive form of natve peoples in different contexts, and stll present in society.
In South America and Central America, the slave process was established and organized for the producton and reproducton of goods and sending products to the European market, thus performing the functons of capitalism.
The slave trade was an important and lucratve maritime trade (Thornton, 2004). European investors were confdent that profts would come from this forced and exploited migraton. In this market, there is the constructon of materials for the storage and transport of prisoners bought on the African coast to be enslaved, maintenance of stock and merchandise, food for the crew, insurance policies for travel - everything well ordered and comple (Gomes, 2019).
The Slave Voyages database is an online memorial of the slavery period, with an extensive amount of data that has been atached in memory of the slave era (Slave Voyages, s.d.). In this database are records that help in understanding how human beings were taken to be subjected to forced labor. Below, Table 1 presents, by way of demonstraton, the records in the slave investors' business inventories. These records are relevant for understanding the volume of African slave trade in economies that, like Brazil, were sustained by slavery for a long time.
It is observed that the number of slaves shipped to the Americas, of the total number of trips made in the period between 1514 and 1866, was 10,666,347. Of these, the enslaved who disembarked (did not die during the transfer) at the destnaton were in total 9,203,722.
Regard to the mortality of enslaved people, there was a considerable percentage, with an average of 12.2%. The deaths occurred for several reasons, including the difcult conditons of the crew. The mistreatiment to which enslaved people were subjected is evident. As objects - they had, therefore, no human value - they were "stored" on ships in a similar way to goods. It should be noted that, from an accountng-fnancial investiment perspectve, these deaths represented a loss of assets; that is, less return on invested capital.
Data from Slave Voyages (s.d.) highlight the percentage of enslaved children: 21.5% on average. Enslaved children were called "slaves" and worked like adults on their masters' farms, and enslaved African children were taken to hard work, just like adults, in all actvites (Peixoto, 2005).
It is observed that, despite the importance that slavery had for the economy, its populaton representaton was not so signifcant according to the data presented in Slaves voyages (s.d.), whose records are important, given that, it is a memorial whose records help in understanding how human beings were brought to be subjected to forced labor.
Considering the need for accountng records of slave trade and slaveholder operatons, critcal accountng proposes to analyze and study the applicaton of accountng tools in periods of history when there was authoritarianism, oppression, such as the period of slavery (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004).
Accounting research in the slave period is still little explored (C. C. S. Araújo & Carneiro, 2020), but it is important to understand accountng history, especially in the midst of oppressive governments. However, there is no way to morally judge the fact that accountng in the past was used to account for enslaved people, objectfying them, since, at the time, in additon to not being a morally wrong practce, it was one of the biggest commercial actvites (Oldroyd, Fleischman, & Tyson, 2008).
During this period, all the components of accountng language were present: the records of the journey from the slave trade to the destnaton for sale in public squares. The depreciaton of the slave also occurred (Lemos, Curado, & L. Machado, 2020), precisely because of the weariness of the enslaved. When slaves got old or sick, many were manumited due to a great economic cost to the slave owner, thus avoiding expenses with "merchandise" (Lemos et al., 2020).
In additon to depreciaton, there was also the taxaton of slaves. Therefore, there was interest on the part of slaveholders in terms of reducing the tax burden on their goods. The general costs of bringing enslaved people were quite high, 40% of gross sales revenue - which atracted the atenton of the Portuguese crown (Lemos et al., 2020; Ribeiro, 2012).
Accountng methods were used to demonstrate that depreciaton, an accountng term referring to the loss of value of the good, was mainly due to the fact that there was no humanized treatiment. That is, the life cycle of enslaved people was reduced, given the mistreatiment and lack of adequate nutriton (A. R. Silva, 2012). This was one of the justfcatons used to spread the idea that free and humanized work would be more economically advantageous.
It is important to emphasize that accountng was a mean used by abolitonists to morally infuence managers towards positve ways of treatng their commodites, such as sugar, tobacco, cofee, coton and slaves (Oldroyd et al., 2008). At the same time that the science of accountng had its functonalites aimed at the oppression of enslaved people, it was also used as a way to avoid it.
Inventory records of the slave trade in 19th century Brazil
In the history and evoluton of accountng related to slavery on Brazilian soil, there are records regarding its formalizaton in the Brazilian colonial period, from 1535 to 1888 (M. Silva & Assis, 2015). The establishment of Brazilian lands as a colony made them a potental for riches to be explored (Medeiros et al., 2016).
In 1549, the frst accountant of the lands of Brazil was pointed by the Portuguese Crown, Gaspar Lamego (Silva & Assis, 2015). The exploitaton of the slave trade demanded that the Portuguese Crown had a method of controlling its possessions. The Royal Family consttuted the "Royal Treasury or Natonal Treasury" to control its fnancial actvites (Medeiros et al., 2016).
During the period of Brazilian slavery, there were times when the average proftability of the slave trade reached 20%, it was the highest worldwide (Brum, 1998). In this period, the average proftability of the slave trade was even greater than the sale of cofee, which yielded a maximum of 15%. Therefore, the enslavement of people was proftable and the aboliton of slavery would negatvely impact this scenario.
Nineteenth-century Brazil is marked, initally, by the arrival of the Portuguese Crown to Brazil in 1808, when accountng had a greater relatonship with fnancial and fscal aspects. The gradual improvement of Accountng Science took place in accordance with the needs of the colony, which included fscal control, tax control, slave trade actvites and also the need for control, of a fnancial nature, of the revenues that the Portuguese Crown received (M. Silva & Assis, 2015).
The function of accounting in the era of slavery - in "oppressive contexts", a term used by A. R. Silva (2014) - was to record the wealth of slaveholders. The Doctor Agostinho Marques Perdigão Malheiro, in his 1866 book, made a historical-legal-social essay on the treatiment of enslaved people during slavery. According to Malheiro (1866), the slaves were treated as a commodity and had no legal and social rights. It was the property of its lord and owed him total submission, without protectve measures by law. This work is of paramount importance, it is a frst-hand study, since the author witnessed slavery at the time it was in force.
As these are large investiments, full of details, if expenses were not properly accounted for, investors in the slave trade could lose their business. Accountng, therefore, served to facilitate the slaveholders' transactons, systematze the slave trade and place value on the enslaved, as well as monitor the productvity of the enslaved (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004).
"Brazil was the largest slaveholding territory in the Western Hemisphere for almost three and a half centuries. It received, alone, almost 5 million African captves, 40% of the total of 12.5 million shipped to America" (Gomes, 2019, p. 24).
What is recorded, whether in images and paintngs from the period, or in newspapers or even in the inventories of slave traders and slave masters, demonstrates that slave traders used the long period of slavery to obtain profts in this market. As much as the Europeans had hope for a fnancial return, trafcking was a risky commercial actvity for investors. As previously mentoned, the navigatons were carried out in poor hygienic conditons for the enslaved, thus causing an average of 12.2% of deaths (Table 1). Some enslaved people died because they weren't fed (Lemos et al., 2020).
The greatest risk of slave actvity would be that the "merchandise" was damaged or did not arrive. Slave masters inspected their products, as it was important that the slave was in good conditon, otherwise it would be rejected (Ribeiro, 2012). Although there was not always care for the enslaved, there was an authoritatve demand for a good physique to work in the felds or in the mines.
The value of enslaved people was associated with physical characteristcs, such as: physical health, youthfulness, gender issues. Men were generally worth more fnancially than women - due to strength (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004).
It should be noted that the enslaved people had different origins - which are located in the current territories of Angola, Congo, Mozambique -, different ethnicites. There was a process of deconstructon of their identtes, which was implemented with great success so that they became only "black people" and, consequently, made it difcult for them to artculate in order to consttute resistance movements (Alencar, Carpi, & Ribeiro, 1994; Quijano, 2000).
Although the slave trade was a growing actvity both in Portugal and in Brazil in the 19th century, England began to carry out diplomatc initatves to end this trade. As these actons had no efect, the Feijó Law was created in 1831, in Brazil, which ended the slave trade (Alencar et al., 1994; C. E. M. Araújo, 2018). However, due to the high profts that the actvity produced, the masters of the enslaved were against the applicaton of this law, which, in fact, did not have the desired purpose.
Another atempt in the form of a law was enacted by the English Parliament in 1845, known as the Bill Aberdeen Act, which proposed the end of the slave trade through the actons of the Royal Navy as inspector of vessels that trafcked African slaves, which caused much controversy regarding the sovereignty of seas. Brazil, then, was pressured to emit the Eusébio de Queiroz Law in 1850. This law was efectve, since, in the following years, there was a signifcant reducton in the slave trade, untl its extncton, although the purpose was to avoid conficts with England (C. E. M. Araújo, 2018).
METHODOLOGICAL PROCEDURES
The objective of this research was to analyze the role of accounting in the slave system in nineteenth-century Brazil. To achieve this, the following methodology was used: a qualitatve approach to the problem. Regarding the strategies, it is a historiographical research, and regarding the means, bibliographical research and documental analysis with an exploratory objectve.
This research appropriates the new history, which is the critcal analysis of historical records (Curado, 2001). Which refers to the interpretaton of meaning given by the actors of the time; in this case, accountng professionals, who created accountng reports and records during slavery. As it is a historiographical research from the 19th century, documental analysis of primary sources was used.
As for the classifcaton of documents, documents from digital public archives were searched, since, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there were limitatons in the collecton of informaton. Therefore, there was adaptaton to most of the informaton obtained from the online search. The collecton of informaton was on electronic sites and the main source of collecton, the digital memorial Slave Voyages.
Documents from public archives of a notary nature were also researched when there was a reducton in contagion in the COVID-19 pandemic. It was then possible to make a visit to the Historical and Geographical Archaeological Insttute of Pernambuco (IAHGP).
The choice of this insttute was due to the fact that it maintains a collecton with data and records from the periods of slavery in Pernambuco, one of the main port locatons for the importaton of enslaved people, as well as due to the geographical proximity, since the Insttute was stll closed in October of 2021, at the time of the research.
It is noteworthy that, during the research planning period, care was taken with the reliability of the sources through the establishment of criteria described below.
In the frst stage of data collecton, a frst checklist was carried out, adapted from Cellard (2008), seeking to meet the reliability criteria presented in Box 2.
For the authority and authentcity of Slave Voyage, the Transatlantc Slave Trade Database, informaton that involves several years of research with a multdisciplinary team of specialists from the contnents involved and the partcipaton of renowned universites, such as Harvard, among other organizatons, was considered (Plataforma 9, 2021).
In order to handle period records in the IAHGP, the researchers had to wear gloves and be more careful with the pages of historical documents dated from 1699-1884. The notary books were searched, in which the commercial transactons of the time were registered. As the purchase, sale and/or donaton of slaves were a very representatve commercial actvity, these records were found together with other operatons of propertes and goods, all handwriten.
There was difculty in interpretng the documents, as the way of writng and language at that time differs from the current one. Difculty remedied with the help of the professional from the IAHGP museum in the interpretaton of the collected documents and in the language of the time, for example: "black" as a synonym for slave.
Next, a list was made of the documents that would be collected, portraying the stages of the slavery cycle, which required the second checklist (Box 3).
Relatve success was obtained in the collecton of materials, the deed of donaton of enslaved people was difcult to fnd because, as previously mentoned, there was no specifc book in the IAHGP for recording the commercial relatons of enslaved people or for donatons. Most of the research time was dedicated to the analysis and interpretaton of the registry books. When we tried the newspapers, they were selected by date, so a random search was set up, in which the desired success was not achieved. It was then decided to conclude the feld and leave this part for future research.
The analyzes arising from this research corpus were carried out based on the narratves found in the material collected in notary records, accountng records, accountng statements, newspapers, images, and database.
All this material was organized, interpreted (mainly the manuscripts) and then classifed according to the stages of the research to be achieved. It was observed that this cycle of slavery consttuted the units of analysis: accountng records of the capture and transport of enslaved people, registraton of purchases and sales in Brazilian lands (as merchandise and forming part of inventories), the role of accountng also in the abolitonist process.
In light of the literature review, it was possible to refect on the accountng records of the slave trade, as well as to examine the accountng of slave buyers through the observaton of the records of farm owners, emphasizing how accountng classifed them in the fnancial statements throughout the process of objectfcaton to which enslaved people were subjected.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: BETWEEN CHAINS AND INVENTORIES
The creaton of South America and Central America goes back to the implanted Eurocentrism and colonialism, whose model of power is based on the elaboraton of the hierarchy of race (dominaton of the naturalized biological consttuton of superiors and inferiors, of the colonized and colonizers) and in the historical forms of control of work, resources and products in the internatonal mercantlist system (Quijano, 2000).
Accountng as an applied social science refers to the analysis and interpretaton of social phenomena that occur in organizatons, refectng the characteristcs of accountng informaton both in its quanttatve (monetary value) and qualitatve (nature of accounts) aspects (Coliath, 2014; Iudícibus, 2021). The slave society in Brazil uses accountng for its records of transactons, productvity and, in general, the assets of slave owners (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004).
In examining the records of the slave trade at the time, it was notced the objectfcaton of slaves and that they were treated as merchandise. The slavery process had its beginning in Africa with the capture of enslaved people. The trafckers acquired prisoners of war or kidnapped the natves, who were chained in order to be subjugated (Figure 1).
The human conditon of these captves was empted when they became merchandise, a stage in which the frst accountng records of the enslaved who would be shipped to their fnal destnaton in the Americas were already made (A. R. Silva, 2012).
The next stage refers to the long journey they undertook. To get a beter idea of how the slave ships sailed, here are some images collected from Slave Voyages.
It can be seen in Figure 3 that, on the vessel in which the enslaved were transported, other goods were also placed. Thus, the view of the time that enslaved people were "commodity" is explicit due to the way the ships were organized, that is, to positon the enslaved in a boxed and subhumanized way. Ribeiro (2012) and Lemos et al. (2020) pointed out in their studies the objectfcaton of enslaved people.
As Quijano (2000) pointed out, enslaved people of the most diverse origins were considered merchandise due to the fact that they were Black people, with race being a hierarchical factor in society, which was in line with the slave mode of producton established at the time in the colonies.
This classic photo (Figure 4) shows how enslaved Africans lived in the holds of ships. Based on supervision, they were randomly distributed and without much space, mothers breasted, most of the enslaved were undressed, there was despair, sad faces. These Africans were forced to be crew members on long routes, which ofen had Brazil as their destnaton.
This is one of the dark and violent faces of slavery and the power relatons behind the coloniality imposed by Eurocentrism to provide labor and proftability. Accountng records were present throughout the process: capture, transport, sale, or donaton. The functon of accountng at that time was linked to the alienaton of the rights of enslaved people, since it made their economic measurement as commodites (Lemos et al., 2020; Oldroyd et al., 2008).
Due to this concepton of the colonizers, the enslaved were equated with the assets and goods of their masters, freely traded as property that formed part of the patrimony. For this reason, it was necessary to register it in a certfcate drawn up in a notary's ofce.
Next, some of the research elements found in the IAHGP from the period of slavery in 19th century Brazil are exposed, which will help in understanding how accountng occurred in this period.
"Seen as a commodity, the slave was treated in the accountng documentaton." (Ordem dos Contabilistas Certfcados [OCC], s.d.). For the records of enslaved people, investors in the slave trade had to do their bookkeeping in the notary ofces of their cites. The enslaved were a mean to the end of obtaining riches without the payment of work in return.
Below, a sheet of records from the bookkeeping book in Figure 6 to exemplify how the process of accountng for a slave buyer took place.
As Ívina Peixoto (2005, p. 146) states, "[...] those involved in the inventory processes were more concerned with fulflling other important requirements for assigning the price of captves: name, sex, age, origin, physical conditon presented by those described [...]"; that is, these aspects were important for carrying out the accountng records (inventory). In contemporary accountng, date, detailed descripton and transacton value remain consttutve elements of accountng entries. However, at the time of slavery, accountng refects the process of alienaton, objectfcaton of the enslaved, determined by the colonizers and naturalized by the colonized.
Next, and stll demonstratng the process of objectfcaton, in Image 7 there is a transcripton of a registraton certfcate for slaves from Paraíba, who, at the time, formed part of the Captaincy of Pernambuco. All slaves should be registered with a descripton of their respectve characteristcs.
In the transcripton of the records of the enslaved (Figure 7), one can see a breakdown of the "merchandise" and also a record of entries and exits. All these details of the enslaved's income were necessary to raise the fnancial statements that were made to control the expenses of the slaves. As Ribeiro (2012, p. 6) mentons, "Expenses were high [...]", therefore, controlling the expenses of enslaved people was an important task for traders to ensure the desired proftability
In this way, there were bookkeeping for purchases, sales, donatons, loans, among others that were necessary. For beter visualizaton, below is an example of a donaton of a female slave by a slave owner, in 1832.
Figure 8 depicts a bureaucratc process of donatng objects and goods that was transcribed by the author of a registry book. The master, the slave owner, has to identfy himself and demonstrate that the donaton of his good, the enslaved person, of free choice. In additon, there had to be witnesses to the donaton. Thus, the legal aspects are evident in the act of donatng an enslaved woman and her child to the donor's godson, who, due to his younger age, will remain as donated goods under the administraton of the godson's parents - similarly to the donaton of goods in contemporary times.
In the advertsement corresponding to Figure 9, A. R. Silva (2014) pointed out how accountng was present in determining the selling price of enslaved women, considering a future "slave" and the skills developed as an infuencing factor. By reportng the characteristcs and skills of the enslaved woman, she seems to have a domestc utlity linked to the sphere of reproducton. In the case of men, this factor was more linked to productve actvites, such as work on cofee and sugar plantatons, among others. It denotes, therefore, an organizaton of actvites that refers to the sexual division of labor.
Accountng records were further developed with the arrival of the Portuguese Crown in Brazil, due to the need for control and taxaton (Lemos et al., 2020; Ribeiro, 2012). In this research, the equivalent of a bookkeeping diary of an important general, Bento da Gama, who was also a slave owner, was obtained.
This entry record contains the name, amounts and date. Bookkeeping always follows the same logic of recording characteristcs, values and datng of events (Figure 10), as demonstrated in Peixoto's research (2005), which indicates the accountng entry at the time as equivalent to the contemporary daily book.
It should be noted that this book, due to its pages being damaged due to time, was not easily lent.
The slave trade contnued even at the time of the aboliton of the slave trade (1831-1888). After the Bill Aberdeen Act, the Britsh Royal Navy supervised the smuggling of enslaved people (C. E. M. Araújo, 2018) and controlled freed slaves through accountng records. In Figure 12, the Britsh Royal Navy escort (lef) goes to the ship "Martha". Thus, in the period of aboliton, we have both the ships of trafckers and ships supervising the sea and repelling and denouncing slavery.
In Brazil, slavery lasted because the transformaton of slavery into industrial capital (export of commodites, such as sugar, to the Old World) implied transferring profts from coloniality to European countries. The end of slave labor meant economically weakening the masters of the colonized territories as minority partners of the European bourgeoisie, since it would be necessary to hire salaried labor - which came to be made up of European immigrant workers, such as Italians and Germans, in the South and Southeast regions (Quijano, 2000).
When slaves entered ships, to be enslaved by investors in the slave trade, records were made as a form of control as well as when they were freed by the Britsh Navy. Generally speaking, accountng was used to convert the qualites of human beings into monetary value; therefore, the accountng records are made in a descriptve format, presentng some categories such as age, gender, weight, among others (Fleischman & Tyson, 2004).
The importance of accountng records, documentary records, at that time, was notable for the purposes of controlling the users of this informaton. Therefore, the service was metculous and indispensable and was used to "map" the freed or
In Figure 13, the visual record of the accounting information, in the form of an inventory of freed slaves, to control operatons. In the descriptve records of the slaves, the following informaton was placed: gender, age, height and physical descripton. This is a record of freed Africans from the Britsh Natonal Archives vessel "NS de Caridad", which was kept as a formal proof of emancipaton to help protect the individual from subsequent re-enslavement (Slave Voyages, 2021, p. 144).
It is regretable to note that the descriptve form of recording the enslaved was identcal to the recording of informaton on other animals and objects on the farm of these investors (Fleischman, Oldroyd, & Tyson, 2004). These inventories demonstrate the need and importance of critcal accountng so that accountng professionals perceive, in the light of sociology, the use of accountng in structures of oppression and, during the slave system, the reproducton of commercial transactons naturalized by society in order to maintain the power of colonialism.
FINAL CONSIDERATIONS
Dark and a wound in the history of humanity: that was the period of slavery. Compulsorily, natves of different ethnic groups in Africa were taken against their will to another contnent to be mistreated, violated and perform forced labor without any remuneraton or respect as human beings.
The slave trade was an organized trade, in which the following operated: the trafckers who imprisoned individuals originatng from different regions of Africa; the buyers; slave masters; sellers; and suppliers. The enslaved, reduced to "blacks", empted of their roots, their identtes and objectfed by the colonial system, were portrayed as assets, "investiment" by their masters, pieces of stock.
Coloniality, as a system applied in Brazilian lands as well as in other neighboring territories, shows the control exercised - in our case, by Portugal - as well as its harmful facets, namely: the foundatons of a complex segregated racial structure, the social constructon of biology as an excluding factor for dominaton, the white colonizers with rights and the colonized and their territories explored as a means (an object) to an end (producton of wealth) directed to the Portuguese Crown.
Deepening the understanding of the period of slavery is essental to understand the relatonships present in the functoning of the structure of Brazilian society. Its current compositon is directly related to the way in which historical facts occurred in Brazil and their legacies, such as the economic and social disparity that stll afects the country.
Accountng as a social science has improved and metamorphosed to accompany changes in society from antquity to the present day, in order to provide more reliable and useful records for the decision-making process.
This research aimed to analyze the role of accountng in the slave system in nineteenth-century Brazil. For this purpose, the accountng bookkeeping or its correspondent was analyzed in a documental way, such as notary books from that period, books and artcles that addressed the theme. In this analysis, the travel records, the descriptve bookkeeping of the enslaved, the sales, cost, and purchase controls of the enslaved are observed.
Given the similarity with current accountng records, with data such as date, value and detailed descripton, it is concluded that, in fact, the enslaved were treated as merchandise, being dehumanized, and that accountng portrayed the ideological concepton of the slave regime, serving to the interests of colonialism by partcipatng with the calculatons and accountng records for the pricing, depreciaton and discharge of enslaved people as if they were merchandise.
It is perceived that accountng as an applied social science could have a more critcal attude and understand that bookkeeping was carried out in an alienated way, thus naturalizing the view determined by the colonizers. Although accountng has also been used for abolitonist purposes, accountng for these changes and contributng to the deconstructon of this slave labor regime, accountng professionals could have understood the process of objectfcaton and questoned their roles and responsibilites.
This research does not exhaust the subject of accountng in the period of slavery. Since there are stll few studies on the subject, there is an incentve for new productons. This is a broad topic that needs more contributons. A suggeston for future research would be an analysis of emancipaton funds as part of the abolitonist movement that enabled the liberaton of enslaved people.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We thank God for empowering us in all work. Our thanks to the Archaeological, Historical and Geographical Insttute of Pernambuco (IAHG) for hostng the research, Professor Dr. Valdineide dos Santos Araújo for his contributons in the development of the study and to everyone who partcipated, directly or indirectly, in the development of this work, enriching the learning process.
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Jacira Pontnta Vaz Monteiro
ORCID: htps://orcid.org/0000-0002-2364-5069
Bachelor in Accountng from the Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB). E-mail: [email protected]
Victoria Puntriano Zuniga de Melo
ORCID: htps://orcid.org/0000-0001-5892-4028
Ph.D. in Social Sciences from the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP); Adjunct Professor at the Departiment of Finance and Accountng (DFC) of Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB). E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]
AUTHOR'S CONTRIBUTION
Jacira Pontnta Vaz Monteiro: Conceptualizaton (Lead); Data curaton (Lead); Formal Analysis (Lead); Investgaton (Equal); Methodology (Equal); Project administraton (Supportng); Resources (Equal); Sofware (Equal); Supervision (Equal); Validaton (Equal); Visualizaton (Lead); Writng - original draf (Lead); Writng - review & editng (Supportng).
Victoria Puntriano Zuniga de Melo: Conceptualizaton (Supportng); Data curaton (Supportng); Formal Analysis (Supportng); Investgaton (Equal); Methodology (Equal); Project administraton (Lead); Resources (Equal); Sofware (Equal); Supervision (Equal); Validaton (Equal); Visualizaton (Supportng); Writng - original draf (Supportng); Writng - review & editng (Lead).
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Abstract
This research analyzes the role of accountng in the slave system of Brazil in the 19th century, looking at the records and inventories of the slave trade and the accountng of the slave buyers. The study had a qualitatve approach using historiographical research. In terms of media, it was bibliographic and documentary with an exploratory objectve. Part of the documentary research was carried out in the online database Slave Voyages and in person at the Historical and Geographical Insttute of Pernambuco (IAHGP). Based on the analysis of the documental sources, from the slave trade to the purchase of the slaves by plantaton owners, the slaves were registered in the accounts as merchandise/ property to generate wealth. Accountng is considered to have reproduced in its records and fnancial statements the naturalizaton of power relatons established by the colonial system. This study contributed to the refecton on the role of accountng professionals who, from a more critcal perspectve, could have understood the process of objectfcaton to which the enslaved were subjected. It also indicates that they cooperated in the abolitonist movement.